He swallows the irritation. It doesn’t matter. All he needs is five minutes.
Five minutes head start to get to Dan and get in the car with him to they can go to the airport and leave all of this shit behind.
Otto pulls open the passenger door of the van. Cam Roth climbs in behind him, taking one of the now empty seats in the back. The omega sits silently with his hands in his lap while he waits for Ronmin to join them.
Otto watches him through the rearview mirror. The guy creeps him out. What kind of person thinks it’s natural for them to always submit to another? It must be a weird way to live a life, he thinks.
Ronmin climbs into the driver’s seat, slamming the door closed with a bang that makes Otto jump. All around them, Fort Gosford wolves are driving away from the Warwick farm for the second time in a week.
“Well, that worked out well,” Ronmin says as he turns the key in the ignition.
“Yes, sir,” Otto agrees, and he’s not lying either. No one died. That’s a win in his books.
“You did well,” Ronmin says, as the van traverses the farm road. The headlights shine white on the apple trees on either side of the road, giving them a spooky veneer. “The negotiation tactic worked.”
“Thank you, sir,” Otto says.
“That’s why I’ve decided not to kill you.”
Otto’s blood runs cold in his veins. He runs the sentence over in his head. Elyse. It has to be Elyse. She told on them. He can’t think of anything else.
The second thought is that Ronmin said you. He didn’t say him.
Oh God, was that a plural you or not?
Maybe it’s a joke: one of Ronmin’s endless taunting jokes that aren’t jokes at all.
“Sir?”
“You’ve got me what I wanted. You’re useful. As a reward, I’m not going to kill you. Nor your little boyfriend either.”
There’s no point denying it. Not now. “Thank you, sir,” Otto whispers. A little voice in the corner of his mind mutters at him that he’s had no place judging Adam Winterstoke for not having any balls.
Otto just thanked a man for not killing him. He’s definitely winning in the ball-less stakes.
He can’t know they were planning on leaving, Otto thinks. There’s no way he’d let that go.
“So, here’s the plan,” Ronmin says. “I’m putting Hamish back in charge of Aylewood until I get someone who’s not drunk or not wrong to take it over.”
“Yes, sir,” Otto says, hating himself more with every ‘sir’.
“If you go back,” Ronmin says with a wide, friendly grin. “I’ll kill him.”
SUMMER
Homecoming
DAN
traffic jams and a hot breakfast
Three months. It’s been three whole months since Dan saw Otto or even heard from him.
He knows he’s alive because Hamish just grunted when Dan asked him and said, “You don’t want to pursue that, boy. Trust me. Just be glad you’re both still alive.”
It’s something to do with the money, Dan thinks. Or maybe Ronmin. Or maybe Otto just got bored. He has no way of telling.
No. It wasn’t boredom. It can’t have been. It was Ronmin.
Dan stands in the kitchen in the manager’s quarters at the Grand Hotel and pours himself a mug of coffee. It’s become a morning ritual as strong as any caffeine addiction: Get up. Pour the coffee. Mope about Otto.
Elyse shuffles in, still in her dressing gown. Dan moves out of the way so she can get to the pot.
“Morning,” she says.
Dan ignores her and leaves the room. It’s been three months he spoke to her too. It feels childish but it’s not. She almost got him and Otto killed.
At first, he felt guilty. He had no proof it was her, but in all of those three months, she hasn’t once asked him why he’s not spoken to her. It’s an admission as strong as if she had signed a confession.
He takes the coffee into his bedroom and closes the door. He puts the coffee down on the nightstand and opens his closet.
This is the next part of the morning ritual. The clothes that he once gave Otto to wear after he came down from the mountain with nothing at all are folded on the top shelf of the closet.
They’ve been washed multiple times since then and long lost the scent of him, but Dan has nothing else of Otto’s. Nothing other than the phone with the empty bank account.
Dan reaches up and takes the clothes anyway, pressing them up against his face. This fabric was once against Otto’s skin. This shirt was too tight and caught slightly when he pulled it over Otto’s head.
He puts the clothes back carefully, folding them neatly in a way that he doesn’t do with anything else.
The world has reset itself. The Winterstokes aren’t under any immediate threat. Hamish is staying in a room at the top of the Grand Hotel and running up a tab at the bar that he’ll never repay, and Dan is alone again.
Pull yourself together, he instructs himself. And that’s a morning ritual too: the morning cheerleader who Dan inevitably tells to fuck off.
He pulls himself together enough to get himself dressed and into the hotel where he’s meeting Hamish for breakfast.
The breakfast room is almost full when he gets there. The weeks before the mating run usually are, as people take their chance to vacation in Aylewood before the woods fill up with horny alphas.
He finds a table for two at the far end and puts his jacket on the chair to indicate that it’s taken, then heads to the breakfast bar.
Hamish is waiting at the table when he gets back.
“You need some new clothes,” the old man says. “You’ve had that jacket since you got to Aylewood.”
“I like it,” Dan replies.
“Any reason you wanted to meet me here?” Hamish says under his breath as he helps himself to a breakfast roll from the basket. “You’re usually a lot more discreet.”
“Elyse isn’t here,” Dan says bluntly.
Hamish grunts again. “Don’t blame her. She was looking out for herself. You know it would have gone badly for her if she didn’t say anything.”
So, it was her. “I don’t care,” Dan says.
“You sound like a lovesick teenager. Not everything is about you. You two fools risked all of us. Me too.”
“I know, but it’s still not fair.”
“Now you definitely do. When did you ever think life was going to be fair, boy?”
“Quit calling me boy,” Dan replies. He’s got a full hot breakfast in front of him, but suddenly he doesn’t want it. He doesn’t want anything. Not even coffee. Things have changed.
He might be alone again but he never used to talk to Hamish like this. He’d never have met with him in such crowded place. He’d not have said anything out loud. He just wouldn’t have risked it. Now, he just doesn’t give a shit.
“I will when you stop behaving like one,” Hamish says. “You going to eat that? You don’t look like you’re going to eat that.”
“Go ahead,” Dan replies, pushing the plate over.
“I told him that too,” Hamish says. “For whatever it’s worth. You two both need to get this out of your heads. Ronmin will never allow it. Not even close.”
You two both need to get this out of your heads.
For the first time in months, hope blossoms in Dan’s chest. Otto still needs to get Dan out of his head.
“Excuse me,” Dan says, pushing his chair back.
Hamish puts up his hands in surrender.
Dan doesn’t stop. He walks out of the Grand Hotel and to the parking area behind it where his police car is parked. It might not be the getaway car that it was before with the toothbrushes and cash under the seat, but they can buy new toothbrushes and Dan’s money is back in his account.
It doesn’t matter. All he needs to do is for Otto to get in the car.
Dan slides into the driver’s seat and starts the engine.
He doesn’t stop driving until he reaches Fort Gosford city center and
has to find parking.
It’s midday and, even though it’s outside of peak hours, the traffic is backed up anyway, a far change from Aylewood which considers a serious traffic jam to be more than four cars in a row.
He parks two blocks away from the Fort Gosford packhouse, mostly because he can’t find parking closer.
Somewhere in the back of his head, a little voice is screaming at him to go home because he’s got a death wish, and if Otto wanted to see him then he’d have come back to Aylewood and run away with him.
Dan ignores it. There’s space for little in his head except the desperate need to see Otto. If they can’t be together, then at least he needs to say goodbye.
He still has enough of a sense of self-preservation that he doesn’t barge right into the packhouse demanding to know where Otto is, even if that’s what he wants to do.
Instead, he sets up camp in a coffee house at the corner of the block and finds a table that lets him watch the comes and goings, as long as he cranes his head a little.
The coffee house is an older one, away from the more modern wooden-floored chains that have taken over the city in recent years. It has a sign proudly proclaiming to have no free Wi-Fi and advising people to talk to each other.
That suits Dan down to the ground. It means that the usual hordes of writers, students and other assorted laptop owners stay away, so Dan doesn’t feel guilty about hogging the corner table, even if he does pay his way in coffee after coffee, and then coffee cake after coffee cake.
It’s early evening and the baristas are starting to wipe down counters and pack away displays when Dan finally sees Otto emerge from the door outside the packhouse.
The sight of Otto is like a bolt of lightning to the brain. He’s taken up almost all Dan’s mental bandwidth for months and, even knowing that Dan came here looking for him, feels like he materialized right out of Dan’s head.
He looks as good as ever, even if there’s a slump to the curve of his shoulders and even from the distance, Dan can see shadows under his eyes.
Dan bolts from the coffee house and races down the street towards him.
As if by instinct, Otto turns immediately and sees him. The big man stops where he stands for a microsecond, then he looks both ways and puts out his hand indicating to Dan to stop.
Dan does. They just stand there, a hundred yards apart staring at each other. Otto’s face looks as if it’s warring with a thousand different emotions.
Otto dips his head to the right, seemingly indicating a street turning off.
Dan nods and takes it.
He’s not got far when Otto catches up with him.
“You idiot,” Otto says, “What the fuck are you doing?”
“I wanted to see you,” Dan stops in the middle of the street and Otto halts beside him. Pedestrians flow by on either side of them like they’re stones in a river.
Otto shakes his head. “Go the fuck home.”
“Otto—”
“He will kill you. He told me he would.”
“I’ll risk it.”
Otto grips Dan’s arm so tight that it hurts. He leans in and when he speaks, it’s more of a hiss. “Dan. Go home. Me and you are done.”
Then he turns and walks away, leaving Dan standing in the middle of hostile city doing his best not to cry.
OTTO
universal idiots and golden auras
Idiot. Damned idiot. Fucking idiot of universal proportions. There aren’t enough words to describe the pure stupidity of Dan just turning up in Fort Gosford like that.
Otto sinks onto his sofa and lays his head in his hands.
But by God, was it good to see him. Otto had wanted to just kiss him right there in the middle of the street and if anyone was shocked, then damn them.
To think, the first time he’d seen Dan’s photo, he’d thought ‘ordinary’. He can’t even imagine thinking that now. Now, everything about Dan seems to give off a golden aura as if he’s made of pure desire.
Idiot.
Otto sighs and gets up. It’s his day off and he was planning on doing nothing other than drinking himself into a stupor and feeling sorry for himself. Now, he even feels bad about doing that.
He’s been given slightly bigger quarters as a reward for his help securing Ronmin’s stake in the Warwick territories. He has actual separate rooms: a bedroom, kitchen and lounge, and a bathroom with both shower and bath. He even has a window that looks out onto the gardens behind.
He hates it. This is his reward for screwing over the Winterstokes and leaving Dan behind. Every time he looks out of the window and stands in his spacious shower, he’s reminded that he’s been bought.
And bought with his own money too. The little savings account has been wiped clean. Ronmin has said nothing and neither has Otto, but they both know it was him.
Even if he wanted to run away with Dan, he can’t. He doesn’t even have the money for a bus ticket, never mind a flight or the cost of the fake IDs they’d need.
They’d need to do it half-assed and on the fly, and that’s a sure-fire way to get caught.
God, he needs a drink. It’s nine-thirty in the morning and he wants a drink. He’s halfway to being Hamish and he’s not even half his age.
What else is he going to spend the day doing? He either mopes about Dan or drinks enough that the thoughts are obliterated. There are no in between options.
Oh damn it. It’s his day off. No one is going to know if he drives to Aylewood and back, and he knows Aylewood now. He knows where to park and where to walk so that he isn’t seen.
As long as they keep out of the way of Elyse, no one is going to know a thing.
And yes, there’s a risk, but Dan’s willing to take it. All Otto needs to do is be less of a coward. And what’s the alternative?
This is no life.
Otto grabs his shopping bags as he leaves, tucking them under his arm so that he looks like he’s just popping out for groceries to anyone paying attention.
He sends Dan a message the moment he gets into the car.
On my way. You know where to meet me. O.
Otto doesn’t think about it as he drives. He can’t. If he thinks about it, he’s going to talk himself out of it, turn the car around and drive straight back to Fort Gosford.
Instead he hooks his phone up to the car’s music system and drives music blaring as he sings at the top of his voice to Rodgers and Hammerstein.
He turns it down as he gets close to Aylewood. Some things he’s not quite ready to share.
He takes a turn off just before the main part of the town and then another, finally turning onto a rough track leading up to one of the myriad of old cabins in the area.
Dan’s police car is parked in the clearing when he arrives.
Otto draws up beside it and gets out. The fresh air hits him like a hurricane. He breathes in deep. He missed this too.
Fort Gosford always smells of exhaust and too many people by contrast.
The door to Dan’s car opens and the tall alpha climbs out, long legs spilling from the too-small space inside.
Dan’s expression is unsure, like he’s not completely sure why Otto has come. He licks his lips nervously and looks at his feet. “It’s good to see you.”
“Yeah, you too,” Otto replies, and it is. Even if everything else goes terribly wrong, he’s not going to be sorry that he got to see Dan for a last time.
“Are we really done?” Dan asks. His voice is steady but Otto can hear the tremor behind it.
“No. I don’t think we ever will be,” Otto replies honestly and it’s the truth. He’s going to be wanting Dan Callister for the rest of his life.
Dan smells like coconuts again, but that’s not the bit of him that smells good. It’s just the pure Dan-ness of him. There are no omega scent glands to drive Otto wild, no biological-mating instinct to spur him on.
It’s just Dan. That’s what he’s addicted to and he’s never going to let go.
They’re standing
close now, chest to chest, close enough to feel the others’ body warmth. Otto can feel Dan’s breath hot against his cheek.
The sound of an engine interrupts the bubble.
Otto jumps away as if he’s been burned. Dan falls back into a forced casual pose against his police car.
Nothing to see here. Move along. Just two men randomly meeting in a clearing in the forest.
The sound of the engine grows louder until a car becomes visible through the trees.
It’s an expensive black sedan with Fort Gosford plates. It draws up beside Otto’s own. Oh shit. Oh shit.
“Well, this is just gross,” Ronmin says as he gets out of the car. Garrett gets out of the other side. Otto recognizes the look on his face. It’s the same one Otto used to use when he wanted to look like a tough man: blank and slightly constipated.
Something about it makes Otto feel slightly better. Garrett might not be on Otto’s side but he’s not completely on Ronmin’s either.
Dan has gone completely white and for the first time that Otto’s known him, the reek of fear fills the air.
“What are you doing here?” Otto says, even though they both know what this is about. The only thing Otto doesn’t know is the how.
“I put a tracker in your car,” Ronmin says casually. “I know whenever you leave Fort Gosford. This is a long way from Fort Gosford, isn’t it Garrett?”
Garrett looks like he wants the ground to swallow him up, but he nods anyway and gives Ronmin a ‘Yes, sir’.
Ronmin steps forward and Otto steps back. He regrets the movement immediately because Ronmin grins widely when he sees it.
“Otto, you are showing so much promise,” Ronmin says. “Is this really how you want to go down? Really?”
“No,” Otto says. He moves closer to Dan. There’s no point pretending there’s nothing going on now.
“Now, you know I don’t like fighting,” Ronmin says. “That’s what you’ve been telling everyone, hasn’t it?”
Otto wracks his brain. It’s definitely what he’s been thinking. He’s not sure he’s ever said it out loud to anyone other than Dan. And maybe Hamish.
Winterstoke Wolves Collection : An MM Mpreg Shifter Romance Bundle Page 78
